Designer Randy Claussen controls the Goosinator, a radio-controlled device that, the inventor said, can be used to humanely chase Canada geese.

Designer Randy Claussen controls the Goosinator, a radio-controlled device that, the inventor said, can be used to humanely chase Canada geese, Thursday, December 20, 2012, from City Park in Denver. RJ Sangosti, The Denver Post

Canada geese fly away after being chased, Thursday, December 20, 2012, from City Park in Denver by the Goosinator.

Canada geese fly away after being chased, Thursday, December 20, 2012, from City Park in Denver by the Goosinator.

The problem: poop. A single Canada goose drops at least 1 pound a day.

Tens of thousands of geese migrate through Denver during winter — and an estimated 700 live year-round just in City Park. Warmer weather and protected habitat encourage more migrants to stay.

“We want to encourage the geese to keep moving,” Gilmore said.

In City Park, carefully refurbished for the 2008 Democratic National Convention, geese graze on tall grass along the lakes’ shorelines. The route past a liberty sculpture is a green-splotched minefield that parks crews struggle to keep clean.

City officials say people complain up to 50 times a week about the mess in City Park.

Across Denver, cleaning up after geese costs $500 to $1,000 a week.

But Goosinating already is controversial.

“Where are geese supposed to go when the Goosinators harass them into leaving?” said Cindy Yeast, who lives near City Park and helps injured geese. “I know people don’t like the goose poop. I don’t like it either. But are we supposed to rid the parks of wildlife just so people don’t step in poop?”

Goosinators, whose 82-decibel whine sounds like a weed whacker crossed with a blender, may drive geese to other parks, city animal and wildlife coordinator Doug Kelley said. If so, they’ll be “humanely hazed away from that area.”

Another refuge may be water-supply reservoirs surrounding the city.

For years, park and golf-course managers have grappled with geese. The big birds feed and breed easily across predator-free landscapes, savoring the equivalent of a buffet on fertilized greenways and ponds.

Denver officials asked Colorado Parks and Wildlife authorities about intensive hazing. State laws allow humane hazing as long as it is not done between April 1 and Aug. 1, when geese may be nesting.

Two Goosinators cost $3,000 each. Denver parks officials say they plan to purchase up to eight more to target geese at Sloan’s Lake, Harvey Park, Washington Park and elsewhere.

They’re enlisting unpaid college interns to run the remote-controlled Goosinators.

Two years of tinkering by design engineer Randy Claussen and his brother-in-law, south-metro golf-course superintendent Mike Ratcliff, led to the Goosinator. Ratcliff had long lamented how he felt like an idiot chasing geese in golf carts and running around ponds clapping. They claim Goosinators, if used regularly, will get rid of 90 percent of geese in a park.

Goosinators have been deployed on golf courses near New York and Boston, around the state Capitol in Madison, Wis., and at the Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado Springs.

This will be cheaper than hiring dogs, which can cost $500 a week.

While the new gizmos may spook the birds, they’re unlikely to have lasting effects, said Terry Hardey, who for 11 years has run Hardey Border Collie Goose Patrol.

“The geese figure out how to avoid most anything you want to dish out,” Hardey said. “The only thing that really works is a live dog that stalks them. It is the body language of the hunt.”

Bruce Finley covers environment issues, the land air and water struggles shaping Colorado and the West. Finley grew up in Colorado, graduated from Stanford, then earned masters degrees in international relations as a Fulbright scholar in Britain and in journalism at Northwestern. He is also a lawyer and previously handled international news with on-site reporting in 40 countries.

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